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Here were new orders-in-council, said they: the leopard cannot change his spots. England is still England the implacable enemy of neutral shipping. "Never will neutrals be perfectly safe till free goods make free ships or till England loses two or three great naval battles," declared the Salem Register.
Pretended blockades without an adequate force was a third charge against the British Government, and closely connected with it that "sweeping system of blockades, under the name of orders-in-council," against which two Republican Administrations had struggled in vain.
The criticism is not altogether fair, for, as Jefferson would himself have replied, peaceable coercion was designed to force the withdrawal of orders-in-council and decrees that menaced the safety of ships and cargoes. The policy might entail some incidental hardships, to be sure, but the end in view was protection of American lives and property.
The British Government could not modify its orders-in-council on unsubstantiated rumors that the offensive French decrees had been revoked. Secretly Foster was informed that the Ministry was prepared to retaliate if the American Government persisted in shutting out British importations.
In April the President issued a proclamation announcing that the British orders-in-council would be withdrawn on the 10th of June, after which date commerce with Great Britain might be renewed.
And as legislation is in the minds of the Western people the panacea of all evils in society, will not the common tendency be to carry on the work of reconstruction by parliament bills and orders-in-council? Is there not here a great danger? "The danger of premature commitment is much greater than that of more cautious policy, proving a stumbling block in the way of future progress."
On the 7th of June the Senate followed the House by the close vote of 19 to 14; and on the following day the President promptly signed the bill which marked the end of an epoch. It is one of the bitterest ironies in history that just twenty-four hours before war was declared at Washington, the new Ministry at Westminster announced its intention of immediately suspending the orders-in-council.
Their very names told of the reasons of the American merchantmen for complaint the reasons why they rejoiced that they were now to have their turn. There were the "Orders-in-Council," the "Right-of-Search," the "Fair-trader," the "Revenge." Some were mere pilot-boats, with a Long Tom amidships and a crew of sixty men; others were vessels of 300 tons, with an armament and crew like a man-of-war.
The recent seizures were not made by orders-in-council, however, but in accordance with a decision recently handed down by the court of appeals in the case of the ship Essex. Following a practice which had become common in recent years, the Essex had sailed with a cargo from Barcelona to Salem and thence to Havana.
It was to be taken for granted that England would do something more than scold about the audacity of the American navy. Even after the declaration of war her most influential men hoped that the repeal of the obnoxious Orders-in-Council might yet avert a solution of the American problem by means of the sword.
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